art posts

Artist creates Google Street View inspired paintings

by Brad Linder Sep 21st 2009

Google Street View makes it easy for people looking for directions to find identifiable landmarks using Google Maps. It also lets you take a virtual walk or drive across any part of the globe that Google has photographed. And plenty of web sites have already popped up that are dedicated to showing interesting, unusual, or funny photographs captured by Google. One artist in Kentucky has found another way to use the service. He paints scenes found on the web using Google Street View.

Bill Guffey has about 3 dozen oil paintings in his Street View series online, although it sounds like has painted even more. Some depict rural scenes, while others capture a moment in time in an urban environment. There are pictures from Amsterdam, London, and New York. But Guffey says he hasn't actually visited most pf the places he's painted.

[via Neatorama]

Tags: art, bill-guffey, google-street-view, paintings, street-view

Filed under: Fun, Internet

Personas: an online art installation with a personal twist

by Jay Hathaway Aug 23rd 2009

Personas is a fascinating piece of web-based art that visually represents just how much the internet knows about you. Type in your name, and Personas will analyze the text of the Google results, breaking your web presence down into various categories. These groupings include everything from "online" to "sports" to "illegal," and each one has a color, so each person's name results in a unique band of colors.

If you have a unique name, Personas can be disturbingly accurate. If not, it's still visually interesting, but other people who share your name can muddy your results. The flaws in this kind of data analysis are part of the project, though: Personas is about showing how smart the web has become, and how far it has to go before software can intelligently trace our digital histories.

Tags: art, mit, personality, personas

Filed under: Design, Fun, Photo, Web services, Web

Psykopaint is an insane online photo painting tool

by Jay Hathaway Jun 3rd 2009

Psykopaint is a new kind of online painting tool that lets you add paint effects to a photo using the photo's original colors. It's extremely easy to achieve striking -- or even creepy -- results by fiddling with Psykopaint's sliders, and the whole thing runs quite smoothly for a Flash app.

Using Psykopaint is as easy as uploading a photo and messing with some of the effects sliders on the side to adjust your brush. Don't worry that there's no way to pick colors, your brush will automatically grab them from your photo. There are sliders for both minimum and maximum, which makes your brush unpredictable and the result more organic. If you set a wide range for brush size, for example, each stroke could end up being a completely different width.

To see what some very serious Psykopainters have come up with, check out the site's gallery. There's some strange, beautiful, and spooky artwork there.

Psykopaint is currently free, but a premium desktop version is in the works.

Tags: art, artistic, flash, image, paint, photo, psykopaint

Filed under: Fun, Video

Yooouuutuuube turns one YouTube video into a wall of YouTube videos

by Jay Hathaway May 10th 2009

Yooouuutuuube is a fun web toy that turns a single YouTube video into a surreal grid made of copies of itself. It's a little difficult to explain without a visual, but the rows of the grid are slightly out of sync with one another, creating a ripple effect. One of the best demonstrations of how much fun Yooouuutuuube can be is this amazing Alice in Wonderland one that's been going around.

The options you can control include the frame size of the grid squares and the size of the rows and columns. While you're watching, there are pan, track and zoom controls that let you move over the whole bizarre like it was one screen. Even the lamest YouTube videos feel like art when you put them into Yooouuutuuube, but the best ones are absolutely delightful.

And before you ask: yes, it does work with the Dramatic Chipmunk.

Tags: art, video, wall, yooouuutuuube, youtube

Filed under: Fun, Utilities

Add-Art is an ad blocker and an art show in one

by Jay Hathaway Feb 6th 2009

Of all the unlikely places to curate an art show, the ad space on websites has to be one of the most unlikely. Instead of shocking a monkey or being invited to meet some "adult friends," how about looking at a selection of art that changes every two weeks? The Add-Art plugin for Firefox comes packaged with Adblock Plus, but instead of removing the ads entirely, it displays images from the current show.

Replacing ads with art sounded a bit hokey to me at first, but its the curation that makes this idea brilliant. There's something uplifting about a campaign to take a space in a website's layout, that people were just going to throw away with ad-blockers anyway, and repurpose it to show them something new. Looking through the past exhibits, one of the more interesting projects was curated by having Amazon Mechanical Turk workers select their favorites: a clever, populist approach to art, made possible by the web.

[via Andrew Richardson on Twitter]

Tags: ad-blocking, adblock, add-art, add-on, art, firefox, plugin

Filed under: Design, Office, Freeware, Open Source

WPClipart offers 23,000+ royalty free images

by Lee Mathews Dec 10th 2008

Locating real royalty free images on the web can be a real pain in the tuckus. Thankfully, Paul Sherman has assembled a massive collection that he's happy to share with all comers.

WPClipart currently boasts 23,872 public domain images covering just about every subject imaginable. Most are offered as lossless PNG files.

You can browse or search for images on the site, and the five main categories (animals, holidays, history, signs and symbols, and cartoons) are available as individual downloads.

If you'd prefer to grab everything in one fell swoop, the entire collection is available as a single download. It weighs in at about 740mb and can also be downloaded from Freeware Files.

The full download also includes WPClipper, a handy viewer/editor application. It's also available on its own from the downloads section.

[ via gHacks ]

Tags: art, clip-art, graphics, images, royalty-free, stock

Filed under: Fun, Time-Wasters, web 2.0

Get Artsy-Fartsy With Mr. Picassohead - Time Waster

by Lee Mathews Sep 8th 2008

Bored? Feeling creative? Why not head over to Mr. Picassohead and throw together a 5-minute masterpiece?

Mr. Picassohead is a simple Flash collage app that lets you put a cubist spin on drag-and-drop image creation. Pick a face, scale it just so, and then start adding your elements. It's ridiculously simple and yet somehow strangely gratifying.

Abstract shapes are included, and you'll need to make use of them to add color behind object like eyes and ears. Changing their color only alters the outlines. When you're all done, be sure to add your signature for that professional finishing touch.

If you're especially proud of your creation, you can save or email it. Impress your friends and family with your artistic genius!

While you're in an artsy mood, don't forget to check out the classic Jacksonpollock.Org, which we wrote about in 2006.

Tags: art, timewaster

Filed under: Fun, Games, Macintosh

It's Cosmic man...it's on my Mac...whoah.

by Drew Olanoff Jul 1st 2008

Do you know those cool art spinning booths at festivals and carnivals? Of course you do, they're awesomesauce aren't they?

Well now thanks to CosmicPainter from garageCube you can bring that to your Mac OSX desktop, minus the carnies and smell of funnel cake (booooo).

CosmicPainter lets you make designs from different pre-set shapes and colors, as well as from other images you already have on your computer. You can really dig in with the shading and depth choices on the pallette and make some really rad shapes and designs.

Why would you want to use this? Because it's hella fun and free.

We sat in front of this thing for hours and got completely lost. But Chris Pirillo, the tipster who sent this in to us, warned us that we'd get sucked in...and we're pretty sure you will too.

[via chris pirillo]

Tags: art, cosmicpainter, mac, osx, paint

Filed under: Design, Developer, Fun, Productivity

Lonely? Get some keyboard characters to keep you company

by Chris Gilmer Aug 27th 2007

Feeling a little lonely as you type away on your keyboard? How about adding a little friend that you don't have to feed, water, or take outside for walks. Keyboard Characters simply slide into the keys of your keyboard and add a little color to your workspace.

Set 1 of the Keyboard Characters comes with 10 friends that include a monkey, robot, fish and a dragon. The price is a little steep at $9.95, but they are cute. The printing quality is supposedly pretty high at 300lpi with UV coating. The characters range in size, with exact sizes shown online under each preview image.

Tags: art, computer, fun, keyboard characters, KeyboardCharacters

Filed under: Design, Developer, Fun, Internet, Beta, web 2.0

Create collages with Collagr

by Chris Gilmer Jul 31st 2007

Feeling a little creative but doesn't want to spend any time at all creating your masterpiece? Try Collagr. But keep in mind, you get what you pay for.

Collagr is a unique website that pulls in photos from Flickr accounts to build a quick photo collage. And 'quick collage' is the main phrase here. These are no Van Gogh or Picasso works here. Collagr simply pulls in photos from your account, no choosing folders, lines them up and drops them in a 1400x1025 pixel JPEG.

Although Collagr is still in its Gamma version, we would like to see a little more artistic feeling added to collages that are created. This site has the potential to make users happy, and in true artistic fashion left us feeling something, it's just that that something was a little unhappy with the piece that was created.

[via ehub]

Tags: application, art, collage, flickr, online, web2, web2.0

Filed under: Design, Fun, Internet, Web services, Social Software

Free your inner artist with Sketchfu

by Lisa Hoover Jul 16th 2007

Though it's possible that web-based drawing tool Sketchfu could be used for some kind of sensible business application, the truth is, it's just plain fun. Sketchfu lets you draw, doodle, and create your own sketches, or build on the drawings of others. There are dozens of colors to choose from and brush sizes range from tiny to the aptly-named "BIG." That's about all the site offers by way of tools at the moment but since Sketchfu is still in its infancy, expect more options to emerge over time.

What makes Sketchfu really spiffy, though, are the options available to you after you're done drawing your picture. Every brush stroke you make while creating your masterpiece is automagically captured and turned into a movie of sorts that shows step-by-step how your drawing came to life. Sketchfu also offers a few ways to share your illustration via email, StumbleUpon, Facebook, MySpace and even a few popular blogging platforms.

In true Web 2.0 community-building fashion, users can comment on and critique the pictures of other users and also vote them up to the "Most Cheered" page. Sketches at the site range from one writer's terrible attempt to try her hand at drawing, to some staggeringly awesome work by the truly talented folks of the interwebs.

Tags: art, drawing, sketchfu, social, software

Filed under: Design, Developer, Fun, Internet, Web services, Social Software

Make your own comics with HyperComics

by Chris Gilmer Jun 25th 2007

When creativity is snooping around inside your head, where can you go for an outlet? If you're into comics, then HyperComics could be your space.

HyperComics is a social network built around comics, naturally. It's a way to network with like minded comic book creators, and get in contact with industry resources. Members can showcase their original material and have other members discuss and comment on creations.

HyperComics uses a desktop application to build comics. It would have been nice if the software was available online, but hey, it could be nice to be able to work where there might not be a connection as well. The application is available for PC's only, and is a whopping 140 MB. So sit back with your favorite drink because this could take a while. When the 30 day trial wears out, the software is $29.99. Licensed comic art is also available on the website as free downloads, and from $2.99 - $9.99 per set. The art sets allow users to drag and drop all kinds of starter artwork, templates, and action imagery into their storyboards. Of course if you are a veteran, you can upload your own creations from scratch into one of the many layout templates. After the comic is made, upload it, publish, and unleash it to the world.

Aspiring comic creators might also want to check out StripGenerator.

Check out some HyperComic screenshots.

Gallery: HyperComic screenshots

Tags: art, book, comics, pc, windows

Filed under: Internet

Shoot an Iraqi artist (with paintballs) over the web

by Brad Linder May 11th 2007

For the next six weeks, Wafaa Bilal will live in a small room in the back of Chicago's Flatfile Galleries. You can logon to watch him any time of day, seven days a week.

While Big Brother and Justin.tv have taught us that this alone might provide a few moments of diversion from the office cubicle, Bilal's stepped things up a notch. Not only can you chat with him or communicate via a webcam. You can also control a paintball gun that will shoot at Bilal -- even when he's sleeping.

What would have just seemed like an odd act of masochism takes on a new meaning when you consider the fact that Bilal was born in Iraq.

It's strange enough that video game addicts are now presented with the opportunity to shoot a real live human being using pretty much the same interface they would normally see when fighting fictional aliens. But the art installation is meant to raise questions of surveillance, obsession with guns, and the American occupation of Iraq.

Bilal has garnered a lot of attention already, so you might not be able to access the website right away, since the server is experiencing some strain. You can also keep up with Bilal's video diary on YouTube.

Tags: art, chicago, domestic tension, DomesticTension, iraq

Filed under: Design, Developer, Fun, Internet, Photo, Web services, Social Software

Picli, the Digg of photos

by Chris Gilmer Apr 2nd 2007

Forget about all the text on Digg, this is all about pretty pictures. Picli is a social image voting gallery. Their system closely resembles your typical Digg / netscape / Reddit social voting system, with a twist, it's for pictures only. This interesting gallery twist to the social voting scene provides a constantly changing image gallery for showcasing creative work.

Users sign up for a free account and submit photos to be ranked and voted up. Users can also vote and comment on the photos of others, getting them up higher on the Picli list, and sharing insights and opinions. There are some great pieces of artwork displayed here, including fractal outputs, drawings, photography, and image manipulations.

Tags: art, digg, drawings, gallery, images, netscape, photography, picli, social, voting

Filed under: Finance, Fun, Internet, Web services, Social Software

MyThings, tell a story and get an estimate on your stuff

by Chris Gilmer Mar 15th 2007

Do you have some things that you would like to tell a story about and connect with people who have the same interests? Maybe even get an estimate of their worth? This is what MyThings brings to the table.

The site was originally developed as a service to track down stolen and looted artworks from World War II, but has since evolved into a separate social network where users can try and valuate the art and antiques of others. Carrying such items as consumer electronics, furniture, collections, or collectibles, MyThings encourages professionals to communicate with owners of the goods in question, giving the item an estimate of worth.

The site is great if you want to get a quick estimate on an item from a community setting. Is it just us, or does everyone think that social networks might be getting a little out of control?

[via webware]

Tags: antiques, art, collectibles, collections, estimate, furniture, mythings, stolen, trace, track, worth

Graveyard Shift - zombie-busting Time Waster

With Halloween fast approaching, it's a great time to get in some practice defending your territory against zombies. In Graveyard Shift, you take aim at zombies and other creepy-crawlies, blasting them into splatters of cartoony green guts. It's a casual first-person shooter, and it's very easy to get the hang of - use the mouse to aim, click to fire. Graveyard Shift has at least 15 levels, and it might even have some secret stages I haven't unlocked yet. They key to getting good at Graveyard Shift is learning to use ...

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